SENECA, Mo. — Stunned survivors picked through the little that was left of their communities Sunday after tornadoes tore across the Plains and the South, killing at least 22 people in three states and leaving behind a trail of destruction.
At least 15 people died in southwestern Missouri in the Saturday evening storms. In the fading mining town of Picher, Okla., at least six people were killed, and at least one person died in storms in Georgia, where a small town was wiped out.
Susan Roberts, 61, stared at the smashed remains of her classic 1985 Cadillac sitting on her living room floor — the only thing left of her Seneca home. A woman who had apparently sought shelter in the car died there, she said.
“That is what is tearing me up,” Roberts said. She had warned the woman — who stopped to change a tire as Roberts and her 13-year-old grandson drove away from the rental house — to escape. The tornado hit just minutes later.
The same storm system earlier hit Oklahoma, where at least six people died and 150 people were injured in Picher. The town was a surreal scene of overturned cars, smashed homes and mattresses, and twisted metal high stuck in the canopy of trees.
“I swear I could see cars floating,” said Herman Hernandez, 68. “And there was a roar, louder and louder.”
As the system moved east Sunday, one of at least six tornadoes in Georgia killed a person in Dublin, about 120 miles southeast of Atlanta, the National Weather Service said.
The body was found in the rubble of a mobile home, said Bryan Rogers, the Laurens County administrator.
The small town of Kite was destroyed by the storm, said Caroline Pope, a spokeswoman for the Johnson County Sheriff’s Department. Close to 1,000 people live in the community, she said.
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